at dean & deluca (recalled)

There was an old woman dressed in red and gold, her hair like yesterday’s spun sugar. Her hands were gnarled with arthritis, curled like claws. She ate a raspberry jam cookie, resting from time to time as if some part of consuming the treat had cost her effort. A young man in a blue blazer came in, and she was momentarily captivated. Maybe he was a ghost to her, someone from her youth, or maybe she had never stopped looking wistfully at young men. When she packed up to leave, she stopped a hip Asian guy with bleached hair and asked if he knew the buses in the neighborhood. He didn’t.